


But Speechless Was My Love

by AuroraPhoenix



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Book/Movie 2: Catching Fire, Canon Compliant, F/M, Family Feels, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Mother-Son Relationship, Regret
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-14
Updated: 2019-11-14
Packaged: 2021-01-31 00:22:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21437119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AuroraPhoenix/pseuds/AuroraPhoenix
Summary: In the year since Peeta returned from the 74th Hunger Games, his mother has considered telling him many things. Now that her final chance to tell him those things has been taken from her, she must live with the weight of all she left unsaid. Set before the Quarter Quell.
Relationships: Mr. Mellark/Mrs. Mellark, Mrs. Mellark & Peeta Mellark
Comments: 6
Kudos: 27





	But Speechless Was My Love

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Airmeo and Paraspark for beta reading an earlier draft and to Curtburt for not giving up hope that I would finish this one shot someday. 
> 
> I'm hoping this story will be the start of my finishing a lot more fics about the Mellark family. 
> 
> The title is inspired by a quote from The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran.

Nora Mellark awoke to the sounds of Capitol voices thick with emotion. Although she lay in bed two rooms from the television, she could still make out most of what the affected voices were saying. She’d have made out more if she were fully listening, she knew, but her focus had been drawn to the darkness outside her window. 

It hadn’t been dark when she’d gone to bed, which meant she must have fallen asleep before sunset. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d fallen asleep so early and trying to remember why she’d done so today sparked an unexpected feeling of unease in the pit of her stomach. Despite this unease, she pushed through her grogginess in search of the reason for her unusual behavior.

When the reason came to her, she inhaled sharply as if a sack of flour had crashed onto her chest. She clutched at her shirt until her knuckles were almost bone white and tried to will air back into her lungs. Tried to push away the choking heaviness that had descended on her. But it was no use.

Because today, her youngest son had been hauled off to the Quarter Quell before she could say goodbye. Today, her last chance with him was revoked.

_ “Stop being so weak!” _she thought, slamming her palm against her chest. The physical sting shocked her body into taking several deep breaths until her breathing stabilized. As soon as she could take regular breaths, she cursed herself out loud.

What did she think she was doing? She needed to get out of bed, stop wallowing, and join what was left of her family for the rest of the recap broadcast. It was pathetic to keep carrying on the way she had today—dropping platters, mixing up orders, and feigning a headache to hide in her room like she was some nerve-racked child. 

It wasn’t as if this were the first time she’d had an opportunity taken away from her. It wasn’t even the first time Peeta had been taken off to die. She should have been used to loss like this. Should have been strong enough to hold herself together under such circumstances.

She eased herself into a sitting position and prepared to force herself out of bed but the next words from the television froze her in place: “And last but certainly not least, we have the heart-wrenching reaping in District 12!”

Before she could stop herself, Nora lay back down. 

Perhaps one day of self-indulgent wallowing was acceptable. Even if it weren’t, she’d rather indulge her weakness alone than flaunt it in front of her family anymore than she already had. 

Squeezing her eyes shut, she tried to block out the words from the television. The volume was lower than usual, so it was easy to let the words mutate into indistinct sounds. At least, until she heard Peeta’s voice: steady, determined, and without a trace of sorrow.

"I volunteer as tribute."

"Stupid child," she murmured, draping her arm over her eyes. But even as the words left her mouth, she knew they weren’t quite true.

Peeta was not stupid - foolhardy and too compassionate, perhaps, but not stupid - and he was barely even a child anymore. The Games had propelled him toward adulthood so much faster than other children his age, he seemed, at times, to live in a different world than that of his brothers or peers. 

Although it had taken weeks after the last Games for Nora to notice how much he had matured, once she did, she sensed his growth in everything. The way he talked to his brothers. The way he approached the victor’s check she taught him to budget. The way he interacted with other merchant families. Even the way he baked. 

And he had grown even more over the past year. He had become more realistic, more self-reliant, and more aware of how little in life did not come with a cost. Despite maintaining some of the gentleness his father had so committedly nurtured in him, it was undeniable that everything he'd been through had hardened him. 

Nora couldn't help but feel a sense of loss over that. 

It was true she had always wanted him to be harder and more practical but the more she noticed the changes in him the more she was struck by the thought that this was not the son she’d come to know over his first sixteen years of life. This was not the boy who even in his early teens had whined about his older brothers leaving him out of their activities. This was not the child who had decorated cookies with neighborhood girls to avoid his older, bullying cousins when his brothers were too busy to protect him. This was not a boy who needed his parents or his brothers to look after him anymore. 

Despite her feelings of loss, Nora had grown to respect this new version of her son. She was just so used to admonishing him to do better that she didn’t know how to express that she was proud of who he had become. 

But she had tried. 

When he’d moved out after the last Games. When he’d returned from the Victory Tour engaged to that Seam girl. All the times since the Quell announcement that he’d been home for dinner. But the words had not come.

Now the last chance she had to find those words had been ripped away from her along with her son. Peeta was going to die in whatever special arena the Gamemakers had chosen for the 75th Hunger Games, and he would never know that she admired the way he had managed to balance the sentimentality his father had instilled in him with her pragmatism. He would never understand that as much as it pained her to see him repeat one of the greatest mistakes of her youth, falling in love with a Seam girl, she respected his unyielding devotion. He would never know that even in her admonishing and silences, she had always loved him.

She slapped a hand over her still closed eyes as tears started falling down her cheeks. How could she have let him go without making sure he understood? Why had she been so stubborn and stupid?

"Nora?" Broa said.

She refused to acknowledge him even as she felt their bed shift under his added weight. She didn’t want to talk to him. Didn’t want to defend herself against whatever he thought of the state she was in.

“Don’t!” she ordered at the feeling of his fingers sliding up her arm. 

“Eleanor, please,” Broa said. He began to brush her tears from her cheek with his thumb, but she slapped his hand away.

“Stop!” she said. “Will you stop pretending you think I deserve your comfort?”

His attempts at comfort only reminded her of her foolishness. More than once, he had urged her to talk to Peeta about her feelings. Had stressed that their youngest son, always so fond of words, would never fully understand what he meant to her if she didn’t tell him. But she had brushed him off, always believing she would have more time. Her tears redoubled as she thought anew of all the chances she’d thrown away.

“I’m not pretending,” Broa said, softly.

“Lie to yourself if you want to but don’t insult my intelligence by lying to me," she snapped. Jerking her hand from her face, she finally looked at him. "I know you’re only trying to comfort me to make yourself feel less helpless. Like I'm some proxy for the son you can't save.”

Broa flinched as if she had hit him, and for the first time all day, Nora felt almost like herself. Wielding her anger like a weapon had reminded her what it felt like to be in control. To be more than this weak version of herself.

She glared at her husband, waiting for him to rise to the attack and give her a reason to dig deeper into the familiarity of her anger. He wanted badly to do it. She could tell by his furrowed eyebrows and clenched fists. But after a long silence he simply sighed and said, “Maybe, you’re right.” 

“What?” she asked. His premature surrender had caught her so off guard that her anger was quickly being replaced with irritation and disbelief. Why hadn’t he taken the bait? Why hadn’t he retaliated like she wanted?

"Maybe, one of the reasons I’m trying to comfort you, even knowing you'll lash out at me, _ is _to make myself feel better about everything I couldn't do for Peeta,” he said. “But that's not much different than what’s been going through your head today, is it?"

His eyes bored into hers, looking past her irritation and anger, until Nora felt a new surge of anguish threaten to overtake her. She turned away before her tears could flood her eyes again.

Damn him. 

Damn him for always being able to see the parts of her she didn't want to look at. Damn him for always being so right about how she felt. 

Because she _ had _spent much of the day thinking if she could just tell Peeta how she felt, maybe, just maybe, it would make up for all the things she had not been able to protect him from. Like the arena that had stolen part of his youth and part of his leg. Or the poverty that had normalized meals of stale bread and years of baking luxuries he'd never get to eat. Or even her own temper, bruising his heart and occasionally his body in ways he never deserved.

She had staked everything on this one opportunity to do right by Peeta, knowing the odds favored his being sent to his death, and now she was unraveling at the reality that she would never be able to fix any of the mistakes she had made with him. And the worst part, the hardest pill to swallow, was that it was unlikely she would have been able to make up for anything in one day anyway.

“Why am I such a fool?” she said, covering her face again. “Such a damn fool.”

“We’re both fools,” Broa said. “We both have let Peeta, Dosa, and Rhye down in more ways than we could count. But--”

“But what?” She interjected. “What else is there but this cycle of acknowledging how much we’ve screwed up then pretending we don’t know the truth until we’re forced to acknowledge it all over again?”

“There’s hope,” Broa said. “Hope that something good we did or said made up for some of what we didn’t do. Hope that it somehow balances out in the end to them. To him.”

She scoffed. Hope? Why had she expected something more than some silly, sentimental response from him? Did he really think hope was going to carry them through the upcoming weeks when they’d have to watch their son die on national TV? Or the years that lay ahead of them when all that would be left of Peeta were their memories and their awareness of all the ways they had failed him?

As Broa stood from the bed to change into his night clothes, she closed her eyes and tried to think back to a memory of something good just to prove Broa wrong. She would show him that nothing good they’d ever done had been enough to make up for what they hadn’t. Prove that his hope was misguided. 

She had nearly dozed off again when a positive memory finally came to her.

Several Sundays ago, after training for the Quell, Peeta had come to help prep the bakery for the next morning. With his help, they had finished quickly so there had been time for her and his brothers to look over the training plan he’d made for the upcoming week. The three of them gave Peeta a few minor suggestions and when there was nothing left to adjust, Nora said to him, “It’s a shame you never got to be captain of the wrestling team. They would have benefitted from your training plans.” 

He stared at her as if expecting her to say something more, perhaps something critical, but she had nothing critical to say. It was a good plan -- not over zealous as his first ones but still full of high expectations for himself, the Seam girl, and their mentor. When he realized she had no more comments, he offered her a shrug and a small smile and said, “I’m sure they’ll find someone better than me.”

The moment had seemed inconsequential to her until she had walked him to the door where, without warning, he had wrapped his arms around her and whispered, “Thanks, mom.” 

Like his father, he was always good at catching her off guard. 

She’d stood frozen in surprise for a few seconds before hugging him tighter than she had in years. They held each other until he loosened his grip, bid her goodnight, and headed back to Victor’s Village.

It was such a small moment. It certainly couldn’t have erased years of messing up and rarely saying the right thing. But perhaps it had given him a little bit of what he deserved but had not received from her often enough.

_ “Maybe there _ is _ hope for us yet, Peeta,” _ she thought, rubbing the dried tears from her face and clinging to the memory of her son’s arms wrapped around her waist.


End file.
